Category Archives: Beerman

Blog entries that pertain to the journey from Apprentice to Master Beerman.

New Brewery: Port City Brewing Company

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This Friday I was fortunate enough to attend the Open House for the newest Production Brewery in the DC area: Port City Brewing.  Actually, I had the day off Friday, I was looking for something to do–a friend of mine had mentioned there was a new brewery opening in Alexandria but he couldn’t remember the name.  Google here I come! I saw this article about it in the Washington Post and thought I could pick up a Growler around lunch (I thought they were already open)–The article mentions that their Belgian Wit would be available — and since I’m currently brewing a wit bier I thought it would be a great opportunity.

I showed up around noon and they were obviously not open.  I was able to poke my head in the back and (fortunately) one of the brewers told me their open house was at 4pm.

I showed back up at 4pm and, sure enough, they were open!

They had two of their four flagship beers available for tasting (see picture above).  Here are the images of the four beers:

The beers were quite nice — I even brought home a growler of the Pale Ale.  Yea, refill for $10 baby!  I was impressed with their setup, operation, and the fact that they were very nice (that’s always a plus in my mind around DC!).  The owner gave us a short tour of their brewery.  Here you can see their base grain storage silo and a shot of where it comes out of their grinding room.

They’ve got a very state-of-the-art brewing system.  Here you can see their mash tuns, kettle, and their 30, 60, and 90 barrel fermentors.

These tanks in the below pictures are their staging vessels for kegging and (soon) bottling.  Just to the left of the tanks you can see their cold storage facility.  Since their beer is not pasteurized it needs to be kept cool.   These tanks will also be used (eventually) for lagering.

They are nearly ready to begin bottling–here’s a shot of their bottling equipment.  An interesting anecdote that may actually interest only me:  they picked up this bottling equipment second-hand from the Southern Tier Brewing company.  That’s another plus in my mind — I love those Southern Tier guys!

Finally, I overheard that their witbier is already on tap at Churchkey.  They have it at a few other spots–but I don’t remember where.  Their WitBier and Pale Ale are ready now.  The Porter is next with the IPA following close on their heels in a couple of weeks!  I can’t wait!  Welcome to the DC area, Port City Brewing!

Beer Mentor

 

 

Williamsburg: (Josiah) Chowning Tavern

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My wife and I visited Colonial Williamsburg last weekend and had lunch at (Josiah) Chowning’s Tavern.

Although the food was excellent and the sight-seeing was awesome, you obviously know I will talk about the brews!  At the top of their menu, they list both a “Seasonal Brew” and a “Specialty Brew.”

Yep, I had both. The first brew, the seasonal, was called “Old Stitch (Devil).”  It was a coffee stout at 5.4% ABV.  Excellent aroma and great flavor! Really hit the spot.  This beer is brewed for Chowning by the Williamsburg Alewerks.  I believe this is actually packaged as their Coffeehouse Stout.  I now have a bottle in my fridge (thanks Total Wine!) and I will see if it is actually the same brew.  We drank these brews out of the ceramic mugs.  Of course, since my wife can’t drink the beer (no Gluten) … she enjoyed a Hot Buttered Rum!

The second beer — the specialty beer — is their “Liebotschaner Cream Ale.”    I looked around for some reference to this beer and couldn’t find it.  It was a very tasty cream ale.  Apparently, this beer is made by The Lion Brewery (Wilkes-Barre, PA) as a contract brew.

Both of these beers were right in style–the only thing that stood out to me was the lack of any kind of head on the the “Old Stitch.”  Otherwise, it was quite tasty–the coffee came through right off the bat.  So, if you make a trip to Colonial Williamsburg, you won’t find yourself lacking in a good brew while visiting!

Enjoy,

Beer Mentor

 

Trappist Beers Re-visited …

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I recently reviewed my posts from my Trappist Thanksgiving trip.  One of the things I covered was the number of Trappist Beers available–I wanted to re-visit this topic.

As a reminder, there are seven (7) Trappist breweries.  I visited 6 of them: Orval, Westvleteren, Westmalle, Achel, Rochefort, and Chimay.

I had a list of the beers they make, but I didn’t give enough detail.  Here they are again (with better detail):

Orval (1) – they make one beer.  It is my favorite beer of all time.  An interesting thing about this beer is that the “wild yeast” used occurs naturally in the “Valley of Gold.”  It’s just a great location!

Westvleteren (3) – They make 3 beers: Westvleteren 12, 8, and the Blond.  I was able to purchase all three of these beers the second time I went to the Brewery (to pick up my two cases of Westvleteren 12).  You can purchase them in the cafe “In de Vrede.”

Westmalle (2 to buy, 1 “Extra”) [see previous post] – They are the Dubbel, the Trippel, and the “Extra.”  The cafe across from the brewery is very nice: Cafe Trappisten.  In my mind, this was the most “modern” of the locations we visited.

 

Achel (5) – There were only two beers available to purchase from Achel at the time … the Blond 8 and the Bruin 8.   Apparently there are three others, two on tap at the Brewery (the Blond 5 and the Bruin 5) and an Extra.  This was the place that had the most extensive store on-site–the best selection of Belgian beer you will find anywhere (I think).

Rochefort (3) – Rochefort had 3 beers available — the 6, the 8, and the 10.  I enjoyed all of these beers … the were very crunchy! <smile>

Chimay (3 to buy, 1 to drink at Auberge) – the three from Chimay to drink/buy are the Blue, the Red, and the White.  The one at the Auberge is actually a “Witbier.”  It is very nice…

Konigshoeven (La Trappe) (7 to buy) – I wish we had been able to add this place on our travels…but we just couldn’t get it done.  We bought six of the seven beers available though.  They are: Blond, Dubbel, Tripel, Quadrupel, Witte, and Isid’Or.  The only one I couldn’t pick up at the time was the Bockbier.

So, the total number of Trappist beers (I think) is 26: 22 to buy and 4 to “drink on location.”  You can see in the picture I have 19 beers.  I had one more on location and then picked up 2 more from Westvleteren — So I’ve had a total of 22 of the 26 Trappist beers.  I need 3 more from Achel and 1 from Konigshoeven–I guess this calls for another trip!

Beer Mentor!

2011 “Beer Drinker of the Year” Finalist: Wynkoop Brewery

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Woooo Hooooo!

I made the finals for the 2011 Beer Drinker of the Year competition sponsored by Wynkoop Brewery.  I will be heading to Denver in February to compete “head-to-head” to see who takes home the prize.  This is the announcement I received (I took the other names out … I wasn’t sure if I should post them or not):

“Hello 2011 Beerdrinker of the Year entrants,

Our panel of experts has counted up the votes for the 2011 Finals.

The ten semifinalists are —- —–, James Clark, —– —–, —– —–, —– —–, —– —–, —– —–, —– —–, —– —– and —– —–.

Congratulations! Seven of you will receive a lovely 2011 Beerdrinker of the Year Semifinalist shirt.   It’s a very fashionable piece of garb and an ultimate beer conversation starter.

Three of you will receive a Finalist shirt and be flown to Denver to compete in the Finals. Those three esteemed folks are James Clark, —– —– and —– —–.

Congrats to you three. We’ll see you in Denver soon.

Thank you all for entering this year’s search, and thanks for doing your mighty part for spreading the wonders of great beer in your communities.

We’ll have full details on the finalists soon at www.wynkoop.com.

Marty Jones

Wynkoop Brewing Co.

Denver, CO”

This is exciting!  I’m looking forward to the trip… not to mention that Wynkoop’s is on the “125 Places to Drink Beer” list … Yeah!

Beer Mentor

“Improve Your Wit” Bier: Primary Fermentation

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All,

Just in case you were wondering if my yeast starter/brew session kicked off “OK” see the photo of my “airlock.”  It went so big that it “Krausen”ed right into the Airlock!

What’s even more interesting is that I put it in the warmest place in my house, and the temp is still holding steady at 68 degrees … yeah, it’s been a little cold around here.

Should be transferring to secondary in the next few days!

Beer Mentor

Brew Day: “Improve Your Wit” Beer

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My friend, Brian, came over today and joined in a little brewing and beer drinking.  It was time to put all the pieces together and get the first brew of the year done.  These first few pictures are of the initial preparation: equipment set up, measuring and note taking–making sure I have it set in my mind how and when to get things done.

For those interested, here is a list of the ingredients and a general rundown of my recipe:

This is a modified recipe (aren’t they all!) that I’ve used a couple of times–I wanted a WitBier this time to help me make it through the cold and think about summer.

Ingredients: 1) 4 Lbs American 2-Row, 6 Lbs White Wheat Malt, 0.75 oz Goldings (60 minutes), 0.25 oz Goldings (5 minutes), 1 oz Orange Peel (dried)+0.5 oz Coriander seeds+0.5 oz Chamomile (5 minutes).  The yeast was one I captured from a previous WitBier that I “resuscitated” from a Saison Dupont bottle.   For the truly Beer Geeky, The projections for Style: OG 1.051, FG 1.010, SRM 3.76, 19.4 IBUs, and 5.3% ABV.

Here are some pictures of the mashing and sparging process.  Again, I mashed 10 Lbs of grain with 3.5 gallons of water @ 168 degrees.  It held rock steady in the Mash Tun @ 154 degrees for 90 minutes.  I then sparged with 168 degree water for 45 minutes, ending up with 6 gallons of wort to boil.  Of course I did most of this inside because it was below freezing outside!

Finally, we boiled it all up outside … tossed our ingredients in at the (mostly) appropriate times, and sat back and had a couple of cold ones.  Here’s a few more pictures of the process.  Because it is so cold in my house, I had to keep the primary fermentor up behind my bar.  Oh, we did hit the projected OG pretty much right on the nose–1.052!

One of the brews we sampled came from The Root Cellar in San Marcos, Texas.  Their local “brewery” is called Darkside…this was labeled as a Pilsner with a Belgian Twist.  It was an excellent beer … my only problem was that I’ve held it for over 6 months and it is a bottle conditioned beer–it had plenty of carbonation, but the flavor was great.  I will be stopping back by through there this summer.

I think I see some bubbling in that fermentor already <smile> ….

Enjoy!
Beer Mentor

#25: The Flying Saucer (Ft Worth, Tx) (#39)

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My daughter and I had the good fortune of being near Ft Worth, Texas on 23 Dec 2010.  A perfect opportunity to head over to The Flying Saucer!  It’s always good to head to the original … this is place #25 for me on the AllAboutBeer.com 125 Places to Drink beer list.  The Flying Saucer is right next to the Bass Performance Hall — a place with a neat history and a great facade (see picture) …

Now on to the Flying Saucer.  I love this place!  I immediately joined the UFO Club in anticipation of completing their 200 Beer Competition.  The food was excellent, the atmosphere was great and the beer list was exceptional!  All three qualities I enjoy in a nice pub!  Here are a couple pictures of the exterior (sorry, taken with my phone … I forgot my camera)

Oh, I forgot, another great thing about this place is a very knowledgeable staff.  Here’s a couple of interior pictures … not the excellent German Sausage plates we had!

Finally, a took a (blurry) picture of the menu … like I said, this place has great character!

Enjoy!

Beer Mentor

“Improve Your Wit” Beer: Yeast Starter

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Yes!  The Yeast starter is working.  I had a slight temperature problem (my Man Cave is too cold right now).  Once I moved the yeast starter down to my bar area, it started going crazy (see pictures).  I will definitely be ready for the “brewing fest” on Sunday!  Hopefully I won’t have to add any DME to this before Sunday.

Beer Mentor

First Brew of 2011: “Improve your Wit” Beer

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In celebration of my friend Ray’s birthday today, I started work on my first brewing project for 2011: A Belgian Witbier.  In his honor, it will be spiced up with Coriander, Bitter Orange Peel, and Chamomile!  The first thing I did was to go to beertools.com and put together (actually modified) a (previous) recipe.  What a great site beertools is!

I had already ordered the ingredients I needed from Northern Brewer.  Those guys are fast and efficient!  Here’s my stash–all I needed was some orange peel and 10 lbs of grain … I already had the hops, coriander, chamomile, and yeast.

Although I already had the yeast, it was in my refrigerator.  I harvested it from a previous brew.  Here’s a shot of my stash and the yeast I picked to use.  This is a 2nd generation sample — I made a Witbier previously, and then a Belgian Session beer, so this yeast is perfect for my style!

The next part of the process was to get a yeast starter going — I’m brewing on Sunday, so it should be ready by then!  Here are some pictures of the process … first, everything should be sanitary–so, a big bucket of sanitizer (I use Star San).

I sanitized my flask and went ahead and pitched my yeast in!

Next, I combined 1/2 cup of Dry Malt Extract with 2 cups of water and boiled it for 10 minutes (to make sure it was sanitized as well!)

While waiting for it to finish, I enjoyed a nice Schneider-Weisse Hefe-Weizen … Yumm!

Next, I chilled my starter in a cold water bath … then put it in with the yeast!

Here it is … ready to begin “fermenting.”  I’m keeping my fingers crossed that this is a still active batch, or I might have to pull another vial … stand by for further updates.

Beer Mentor